I haven’t done a post today yet, so I thought I would bring up something that’s been on my mind ever since I started working on my fantasy novel – the dreaded fantasy cliche. Just to start things off, here are a few lists of fantasy cliches I found on the Internets: The Grand List read more

As small pockets of civilization around the world celebrated their survival of the Dec. 21 Mayan apocalypse, the vast majority of normal people have angrily demanded to know how things could have possibly gone so wrong. The world as we knew it was supposed to end at precisely 10:11pm (Australia Eastern Standard Time) on Friday, read more

In my humble opinion, George Costanza (Seinfeld) is the greatest sitcom character of all time. And naturally, the actor that plays George, Jason Alexander, is my favourite sitcom actor (and probably TV actor) of all time. And so when I found out that Jason Alexander’s Comedy Spectacular was returning to Sydney, I didn’t hesitate to read more

X-Men: Days of Future Past, my second-most anticipated film of 2014, has done the impossible by living up to the loftiest of expectations. I was sceptical at first when I heard that they were making this film, an ambitious attempt to combine the old X-Men franchise (X-Men, X2 and The Last Stand) with the new, younger read more

Movie Review: Unknown (2011)

I had been looking forward to seeing Liam Neeson’s latest thriller, Unknown, ever since I saw the trailer a few months ago. It reminded me of Taken (another Neeson film), one of my surprise favourites from a couple of years back, with an compelling mystery anchoring the plot — a biologist visits Berlin with his wife and has an accident, and when he wakes up from a coma days later, another man has assumed his life.

Is there a conspiracy at play here, or has he lost his mind? And what lengths will he go to in order to uncover the truth and take back his life?

For the most part, Unknown unfolds as expected. Nothing appears to make sense, and it keeps you guessing whether what you’re seeing is real, imagined, or perhaps both. At the same time, there is action, suspense and thrills, and plenty of it. I can honestly say I was intrigued.

Of course, Liam Neeson is brilliant, but the supporting cast wasn’t too shabby either — Diane Kruger, January Jones, Aidan Quinn, and Frank Langella. Each actor/actress manages to put their stamp on their characters, even with limited screen time.

Director Jaume Collet-Serra (who directed the underrated Orphan) does a fairly good job here with some pretty farcical material (and I’m not just talking about how improbable it is for someone as attractive as Diane Kruger playing a taxi driver).

In less capable hands, Unknown could have easily spiralled out of control, but despite all the plot holes and unnecessary convolution in the unravelling of the mystery, the film manages to stay afloat and avoid total disaster.

Ordinarily, films with predicaments this bizarre can only end in bitter disappointment. You’ll tend to be riveted by the mystery until you discover the truth, which is usually outrageous or silly or both, and the film just completely crumbles from that point on. Surprisingly, Unknown‘s resolution is about as good as you can get for a film of this kind. It’s not necessarily believable, but considering how far it takes you, it’s at least within the realm of possibility. Or so I tell myself…

One thought on “Movie Review: Unknown (2011)”

This film was a great watch, for any of those people that love a good action movie, I would recommend this for them. The film also has great suspense, my boyfriend choose this movie i wouldn’t have actually chosen this one to watch as it was a thriller and I don’t subject myself to those types of films. But I was actually quite surprised, I enjoyed it.